01 June 2010

Speed Blogging

A Swiss banker blows the whistle on tax evasion so the feds throw him in prison. His boss goes free. Haven't these idiots ever heard of incentives? FAIL.

Good story on the SHADY financing and BIG subsidies to Poseidon's desalination plant in Southern California. Given that locals already use 300 gallons per person per day (1,200 lcd!) and local managers (Poseidon's overseers) are incompetent, this is looking like a disaster waiting to happen.

Klamath farmers say they "need" more water, so they want to mine groundwater. Sounds like Klamath needs fewer farmers. I suggest that they cap extractions at sustainable levels, hand out permits to existing farmers and let them trade until 50 percent of farmers are retired. Speaking of overallocation, this story on California's salmon fisherman notes that there are only "90 fish per boat." Time to retire some boats? ITQs please!

Bill Heasley says that the US sells $10 billion more food to China than we buy from them. He points out that such a surplus requires that we do a good job at managing our water; if we use it unsustainably, then we are destroying ourselves so they can get cheaper food. I totally agree.

1 comment:

David, we all recognized the desal plant would be a failure when they named it Poseidon.

If Klamath has fewer farmers, then we'll have to deal with an even stronger oligopoly. Perhaps it needs fewer farmed acres, or a shift to farming produce that uses less water.

The salmon shortage is man-made, but not because of the fleet (this time) - because of the Westlands. As for ITQ's, it ain't a one-size fits all sort of thing, and I haven't studied the literature on its efficacy vis a vis the pacific salmon fleet.